DINO BATTLE!!

[Zakk]

Re: Nuisance algae

test your RO water, not your tank water  ;D

http://www.canreef.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=77600

http://www.canreef.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=77132&highlight=UV

http://www.canreef.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=76025&highlight=UV

http://www.canreef.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=76924&highlight=UV

RO water has been 0.00 phosphates since I replaced the DI resin with a DOW one.  Thanks for the links though, the search didn't work for me at all (and it won't send me a confirmation email to sign up)

 

[phi delt reefer]

Re: Nuisance algae

they should send it to you shortly...check your junk mail. the admins have to send it.

 

[Darryl_V]

Re: Nuisance algae

Don't make too many changes......double check the basics.....due diligence on the husbandry and in time it will go away for sure.

I just set up a new frag tank and algae has gone rampant in there (display lacks any problem algae at all)....the high light and new surface area does that.  You have done both...new light and new sand.  Give it time.......a few months at least and if all your basics are covered it will clear up.....I promise.

 

[Seggsy]

Re: Nuisance algae

If you decide to do something more drastic like bulk lime, I am sure there are some fellow reefers who are nearby and could livestock-sit your star, etc (unless that would pose a contamination threat - hmmmm, just thought of that...)

 

[Zakk]

Re: Nuisance algae

Don't make too many changes......double check the basics.....due diligence on the husbandry and in time it will go away for sure.

I just set up a new frag tank and algae has gone rampant in there (display lacks any problem algae at all)....the high light and new surface area does that.  You have done both...new light and new sand.  Give it time.......a few months at least and if all your basics are covered it will clear up.....I promise.

haha the funny part is I've never seen stock like you have, I have to fight the impatience.

Absolutely you are right, slow and steady.  I was so far behind the 8 ball in terms of husbandry I literally fixed things too fast.  Sometimes having excess money for a hobby isn't the best thing.  I did have the algae issue before the new substrate, but I'm splitting hairs there.  I think that if I can beat this outbreak I can keep this tank a '10'.  Money is not an issue any more, but as I said, I've never seen an algae that can grow before my eyes.  You should see them under the microscope, they are insanely active, I could see that driving a coral nuts, unlike a true algae that is more plantlike. 

Turbo snails still powering all over the tank, knocking down every coral that isn't glued down, and they haven't kicked it yet (although the extra activity may mean they're starting to starve from toxic poisoning).  We'll see.  The skimmate smells like the pits of hell....I call it sulfur ass smell. 

 

[phi delt reefer]

Re: Nuisance algae

hey zakk READ THIS!

http://www.reef2reef.com/forums/reef-discussion/52084-dinoflagellates-my-experience-h2o2-reefing-tool.html

 

[Zakk]

Re: Nuisance algae

hey zakk READ THIS!

http://www.reef2reef.com/forums/reef-discussion/52084-dinoflagellates-my-experience-h2o2-reefing-tool.html

Good find, thank you!!!  Reading through it now, and by coincidence I picked up some hydrogen peroxide today while I was at the drugstore getting pop since this tank problem has surely driven me to drink.  Now I have to get back to reading, Cheers!!!! 

 

[Zakk]

dinos

Good read, fell asleep in the chair while reading it, maybe the dinos have affected me and are trying to keep me from trying this. 

A little frustrating that a ton of people in that thread said they would try it and post results, and very few actually did except the op. 

Tank today is 80% better after the blackout, but I may try this as  a secondary measure as it did seem pretty universal that it was -seemingly- harmless to most of the occupants.




.... so dosed 14ml H2O2.  Immediate drop in ORP as expected (35 to 270).  Nothing even blinked.  In fact, hit the lights so I could watch for any noticable reactions, and there were none, everything is dino free and opening (likely due to the 2 days of dark and 2 days of actinic only).  I will do a short light cycle tonight, then check again tomorrow. 

One slight surprise...after stopping GFO and water changes a couple of days ago, phosphates shot back up to .13 today.  So there is likely leaching from liverock and/or sand bed as I really haven't fed much except a tiny bit of reef roids. I think I'll let the tank run a wee bit dirty for a few days before I consider starting the gfo reactor up again. 

Hopefully this might help someone later on, although if you are reading this thread because you have dinos, I really feel sorry for you!

 

[phi delt reefer]

keep up with the h202.. i think you want the redox at 300 ish so you may want to up the dose but research it more if you do.

 

[Zakk]

Well it's funny, I had grabbed that bottle of peroxide on a whim today... thinking along the lines of "I'd have to be crazy to actually pour this into a tank", of course I thought that about vodka too, so go figure.

I will likely stick with the recommended dose for now, and a 4 hour light schedule.  Everything looked healthy in there tonight, but I don't want to push it.  ORP is back to 351, it went down and took an hour to steadily rise back up.  The blackout did a good job so I may still do a 3 day blackout once a month, the corals actually look quite healthy now that they aren't closed up with snot on them.  The only guy I didn't see was a firefish, but he's skitterish anyway so he might just be hiding.  The skimmate smells like death rolled over, I was grossing out my kids with it today.  It was plain rank.  Not sure if that's livestock die off, or just a side effect of something else.  There was even a sulpher tinge to it, maybe the bacterban7 results in something like that.

The only guy that is really freaky is the brittle star.  He's in a corner with all of his legs pulled back into squiggles.  Still, if he can survive splitting himself in two, he can probably survive this. 

 

[Darryl_V]

Wow hydrogen Peroxide eh!....hope this helps get the problem under control.  Good luck.

 

[Neopimp]

I suggested peroxide as a aiptaasia killer and was doubted as no being safe for the tank .... who's laughing now JK

Either way they shriven up and let go after you inject them or even get close...

Hope the Dinos go they way of .. well.. the dinos

 

[Zakk]

Wow hydrogen Peroxide eh!....hope this helps get the problem under control.  Good luck.

Oddly enough... I read about this a week or so ago, but thought "no way, sounds like a quick-fix crackpot idea".  However, when reading through the horror stories of total tank losses from dinos, it started to look better and better.  I was able to beat hair and cyano with better water quality, but what do you do when you have a deadly pest that thrives because water quality is so good it doesn't have to compete with anything else for the remaining nutrients?

I hope this works so that I can resume a proper maintenance schedule...I was loving the low readings , the crystal clear water, and the blinding new LED's.  Also, I'm chomping at the bit for some new frags  ;D 

I never even tried 'slime away' or anything like that with my cyano problem, I just stuck to the water changes and the carbon and gfo and the dosing.  Really what do you do when trace elements from a water change make the pests grow back in front of your eyes.  I never thought of myself as a 'last resort' kind of guy, but there is also the problem of the toxicity starting to kill livestock.  The way the skimmate smells, -something- is dying in there, just not sure what.  hopefully it's just these things. 

 

[Zakk]

I suggested peroxide as a aiptaasia killer and was doubted as no being safe for the tank .... who's laughing now JK

Either way they shriven up and let go after you inject them or even get close...

Hope the Dinos go they way of .. well.. the dinos

A lot of people using it full strength as a dip for GHA.  If it just knocks this stuff out of the water column and leaves everything else alone, it's sort of a miracle cure.  I'll do 5 days then stop, even if it's not gone.  Some people were talking about a maintenance dose every day in low concentrations, but I think that there has to be long term effects to doing that.  It is funny how ORP drops like a stone when it's introduced.  Amazing what probes and sensors can 'see' in a tank now.  I tell you though, I WISH I was just battling aiptasia.  Joes juice has always knocked them out for me in the past, and coralRX seems to keep them out of the tank now.

Funny, I dipped a tiny little coral frag into coralRX the other day...almost didn't because it was such a small frag, and damn if there wasn't a tiny dead flatworm, and about 5 teeny bristleworms in the bowl after.  I don't care about the bristles, but that flatworm could have been the start of an infestation. 

 

[Zakk]

Just a snapshot....you can tell the days the lights were out by the PH, and can you tell when I added the peroxide?

 

[Neopimp]

ya peroxide being an oxidizer will have a huge affect on the balance.  I am sure you have done all the reading about it and will spare you a mangled what I remeber from college chemistry lesson

 

[Zakk]

ya peroxide being an oxidizer will have a huge affect on the balance.  I am sure you have done all the reading about it and will spare you a mangled what I remeber from college chemistry lesson

I swear, I spent 2 hours today looking at samples from the tank under a microscope, that's likely more time than I spent doing it in high school when I was supposed to. 

You would think that as an oxidizer ORP would increase, but indeed it does not.  I just did dose #2 today, and ORP dropped even more today than yesterday, even though it had returned to it's normal levels.  Very interesting.

Looking at the slides today, it is a very different scene in there from 2 days ago.  They are still moving around, but while they were free floating masses before, they are swimming around and in masses of ?? today.  Might be more conventional algae, it might be dead material, I'm not sure.

If I had to rate the tank today from 1-10, with 10 being the infested mess it was a few days ago, and 1 being the crystal clear joy it was 2 weeks ago, I would put it at 3.  I siphoned out what I could today, and it didn't grow back immediately as before.  So we'll see.  As far as I can tell, I'm doing everything that people who have beat this have said to do.  Blackout, high PH (up to 8.35 now), cut back on water changes, siphon and blast what I can, and dosing peroxide at 1ml per 10gal (plus sump minus rock). 

 

[phi delt reefer]

are you dosing 1ml/10 gallons once daily or spreading the dose through the day?

 

[pulpfiction1]

ive also used the h2o2 method, but on bubble algae(posted back in april) and had success,should also work for GHA peroxide is mostly oxygen and realtivley safe in the aquarium as long as one dont go overboard,all changes should be done in a slow process IMHO.I hope it works out for you

c/p:
Hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) is the simplest peroxide (a compound with an oxygen-oxygen single bond) and an oxidizer. Hydrogen peroxide is a clear liquid, slightly more viscous than water. In dilute solution it appears colorless. With its oxidizing properties, hydrogen peroxide is often used as a bleach or cleaning agent. The oxidizing capacity of hydrogen peroxide is so strong that it is considered a highly reactive oxygen species. Hydrogen peroxide is used as a propellant in rocketry.[2] Hydrogen peroxide is naturally produced in organisms as a by-product of oxidative metabolism. Nearly all living things (specifically, all obligate and facultative aerobes) possess enzymes known as catalyse peroxidases, which harmlessly and catalytically decompose low concentrations of hydrogen peroxide to water and oxygen.

 

[Zakk]

are you dosing 1ml/10 gallons once daily or spreading the dose through the day?

All at once.  I worry that if I spread it out, I will decrease the effectiveness.  I turn carbon off for an hour after dosing too.  I dose slowly into the sump. Takes about 3 minutes for the ORP probe to register the massive drop, but honestly, nothing in the tank reacts at all.